The Good Doctor (Mondays at 10:00 on ABC)
The Good Doctor sounds like a title a kindergartener may have come up with, and I can't tell if that's the point or not. Of course, it would have been a hard sell if the title more accurately described the show (something like Autistic Doogie Howser), but it would at least prepare you for the mawkishness you were set to endure. Reading more like an extended after-school special, or even an employee training video on tolerance, The Good Doctor instead makes a spectacle of its lead's disorder and gives itself a nice pat on the back for inclusivity while still being completely absurd.
It's admirable and even laudable that ABC, alongside David Shore and Daniel Dae Kim (who have developed the series from a South Korean format), have attempted a series with a protagonist with autism. (Netflix also recently released a half-hour dramedy, Atypical, about a teen with the disorder.) But instead of bringing focus to the issue of how those with differing abilities are understood and treated in the workplace (and the world at large, for that matter), The Good Doctor breaks it down into easy-to-grasp and borderline-offensive terms. Take, for example, a late-episode scene when Shaun Murphy (Freddie Highmore, Bates Motel), our hero and a resident pediatric surgeon in San Jose by way of Wisconsin, steps into surgery with the gruff team leader (Nicholas Gonzalez, who seems to be in just about every show on TV). Dr. Melendez informs Shaun that as long as he's at this hospital, he'll never do more than provide basic assistance, despite his knowledge having recently saved a young boy's life. Shaun confronts him (nonconfrontationally, though, because autism) by saying, "You are very arrogant... Is it worth it?" While a patient's exposed heart is beating on the operating table.
I get it; Shore is showing the lack of social skills which plagues many with autism. But for fuck's sake, would a kid who is so concerned with saving people really choose open-heart surgery to have this particular conversation? Does having autism and Savant Syndrome also make you a speaker of hard truths? Shaun has just given the hospital board, a collection of holier-than-thou bigots (because, again, we're filling in a paint-by-numbers picture of how mean the general population is toward those with autism), a stirring and ridiculous speech about how he wanted to become a surgeon so he could save children and give them a chance at living, a chance his dead bunny never had when it died on "the day the rain smelled like ice cream." Contrast this with the many other instances in the pilot where Shaun does remarkable work in an airport creating a one-way valve out of vending machine tubing, duty-free bourbon, and a confiscated box opener, and it creates a confused image of how exactly we're supposed to view Shaun. We are obviously meant to feel sympathy for him, as the syrupy flashbacks to Shaun's pre-teen years make clear, but he's represented as a genius who also can't give clear answers when simple questions are asked of him.
But what do I know, perhaps that's a completely accurate representation of some autistic folks. But going off my own personal experience being around autistic children, Shaun is hardly representative of what is typical or expected. As his mentor says, he's high-functioning (which adds even more offense, as if this particular case is okay for the hospital to sign-off on because he's only kind-of autistic), but then we get moments like the bunny monologue that make Shaun seem seriously developmentally impaired. It's odd, and Shore's script can't seem to walk the line between sensitive and offensive, crossing wildly over into both areas throughout the first hour.
If there's one particularly bright spot, however, it's Highmore's performance. He does more to communicate Shaun's discomfort and otherness with his body language and eyes than the entire story does. Seeing him switch from his standoffish, hyper-focus on rituals to jumping into the fray to help save an injured child is the pilot's highlight. Seeing how awkwardly he accepts a hug from the child's mother shows more character than any of the lines he's given. It's a truly magnetic, beautifully realized performance that stands head-and-shoulders above the material.
Because when it comes down to it, The Good Doctor is a simple, manipulative exercise in trying to showcase diversity while doing it no real service.
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